NATELA KHINCHIGASHVILI - Tbilisi State University

miTologiuri diskursi da kulturis
tipologia
Mythological Discourse and The Typology of Culture
POVILAS ALEKSANDRAVIČIUS
Lithuania, Vilnius
Mykolas Romeris University
176
Heidegger, Myth and Nazism
The article discusses myth and philosophy in Heidegger’s works. Following
a rational tradition of Western metaphysics, Heidegger raises the issue of the
grounding of the universe; however, questioning the grounding of rationality
itself, he points to a mythical world. As a consequence, Heidegger separates
himself from the traditional paradigm of Western thought. He does not impose
rational structures onto myth but, on the contrary, perceives a historical process
of the development of rationality as a part of mythical history. Expressing this
history through ontological categories, the German philosopher views the
course of rationality as a tendency towards a technocratic thought – the ultimate
form of the obliteration of being.
Key words: Heidegger, Hölderlin, myth, rationalism, history of being, gods,
Nazism.
POVILAS ALEKSANDRAVIČIUS
Lithuania, Vilnius
Mykolas Romeris University
Heidegger, Myth and Nazism
Introduction
The relationship between philosophy and myth is most commonly viewed as
an opposition between two different ways of world interpretation, and matching
one to the other is only as possible as reconciling the irrational and rational ways
of thinking. Is there a possible common denominator between such different
poles of thought, bearing in mind that we live (I speak only as a representative
of European civilization) in a space soaked in rationalism? With regards to this
question, Martin Heidegger’s interpretation of history comprises one of the
most prominent moments in the thought of the 20 th century. In the reasoning of
the German philosopher, myth did not appear immediately but rather after a